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I stride forward, tuning out the memories of being trapped—both physically and emotionally—as well as I can. Even the mineral scent in the air stirs up more recollections of our former island prison.
Another man comes striding along the hallway toward us, and we flatten ourselves against the wall to let him pass. There’s no point in causing more of a commotion than we need to if we can avoid notice completely.
We turn a corner and come to a stairwell. As quickly as possible, we slip past the door and follow Griffin’s eager signals down, two floors lower.
My mouth has gone dry. I wet my lips and try to estimate how much time has already passed. Fifteen minutes? Twenty?
How much longer do we have until our disguise falters? Andreas’s powers aren’t an exact science.
If only I had a watch… Of course, I wouldn’t be able to see it.
The thought brings a brief spark of amusement that’s quickly swallowed up by my nervousness. We dart out into the hallway Griffin indicates and trail after him to the left.
The stone-walled hallway down here is narrower than the one above, the ceiling lower. My chest constricts with the growing sense of them closing in. An image of the windowless room Clancy kept me trapped in between training sessions floats in the back of my mind.
I broke free of that place, and we’ll break out any shadowbloods trapped here too. After we’ve dealt with our most psychotic captor for the last time.
Griffin’s progress ahead of us slows. My body tenses in anticipation.
Then he stops completely, right by a plain white door that looks just like the other doors dotting the hallway. But his certainty that our target waits on the other side flows into me with his power.
Now it’s up to the rest of us to see the final part of the plan through.
Mostly, it comes down to me.
I think of Balthazar’s uncaring expression while fourteen-year-old Lindsay bled out on his villa floor. Of the plastic case that enclosed Dominic while he left my tentacled guy in a coma for weeks.
Of the rocks falling on our heads in a passage even narrower than this one, one last attempt at caging us in and preventing our escape from his beautiful prison.
A brutal vibration grips the base of my throat. I focus my mind on it and reach out to touch Jacob where I can sense him standing near me—my signal that I’m ready.
He steps toward the door. I don’t know whether it’s even locked, but if it is, he makes quick work of the deadbolt.
He shoves the door wide with an invisible burst of energy, and I spring over the threshold.
If Balthazar’s desk had been set right across from the door, I think I’d have killed him that instant. But all I see in my first glimpse of the room are a pair of matching bookcases—which Sorsha promptly sends up in flames.
As I spin around, catching sight of the desk next to the door and the burly man behind it at the edge of my vision, Balthazar jerks to his feet. He slams his broad hand down on some control I don’t have time to scrutinize.
Before I can process any more than that, a piercing shriek that has nothing to do with me splits through the air. It rattles my eardrums and scatters my thoughts, smashing straight through my focus.
I lose my grip on my power. My hands clamp instinctively over my ears as pain spikes through my skull.
In that first moment, I can’t see the others, only feel their own agony radiating through our bond. Then the air wavers around me.
Our invisibility is faltering. I catch sight of Dominic’s grimacing face, Sorsha plugging her ears with her fingers and whipping around with a sway of her feet—
As we pop into sight, Balthazar is disappearing. His head is just ducking under an opening where he kicked aside a rug beyond his desk.
Bursts of fire shoot up from the desk and the rug, but the deafening siren has obviously shattered Sorsha’s concentration too. She staggers and then aims a hostile look at the device sitting on the corner of the desk.
Another rush of flames shoots up there, and the sound squeals out.
“Come on!” Jacob says in a ragged voice, and lurches toward the trap door Balthazar vanished through.
Sorsha leaps after him and swears. I understand why when I jump after them a moment later.
We’ve ended up in a thin tunnel carved into the mountain. A tunnel where water is spraying from fixtures on the walls and ceiling, like a fire sprinkler system gone haywire. The pale lights spaced several feet apart along the passage glint off the droplets.
